The Serbs are believed
to be a purely Slavic people who originated in Ukraine. Some scholars
now argue that the original Serbs and Croats were Central Asian Sarmatian
nomads who entered Europe with the Huns in the fourth century C.E. The
theory proposes that the Sarmatian Serbs settled in a land designated
as White Serbia, in what is now Saxony and western Poland. The Sarmatian
Serbs, it is argued, intermarried with the indigenous Slavs of the region,
adopted their language and transferred their name to the Slavs.

Arrival to the
Balkans

Byzantine sources
report that some Serbs migrated southward in the seventh century C.E.
and eventually settled in the lands that now make up southern Serbia,
Montenegro, Kosovo, Bosnia and Herzegovina. Rival chiefs, or "zupani,"
vied to control the Serbs for five centuries after the migration. Zupan
Vlastimir formed a Serbian principality under the Byzantines around
850, and the Serbs soon converted to Eastern Christianity. The Serbs
had two political centers in the 11th century: Zeta, in the mountains
of present-day Montenegro, and Raska, located in modern southwestern
Serbia.

First Serbian
State

The zupan of Raska,
Stefan I Nemanja (1159-96), threw off Byzantine domination and laid
the foundation for medieval Serbia by conquering Zeta and part of southern
Dalmatia. His son and successor, Stefan II Nemanja (1196-1228), transformed
Serbia into a stable state, friendly with Rome but with religious loyalty
to Constantinople. In 1218, Pope Honorius III recognized Serbian political
independence and crowned Stefan II king. The writings of Stefan II and
his brother (canonized as St. Sava) were the first works of Serbian
literature.

Later kings in the
Nemanja line overcame internal rivalries and pressure from Bulgaria
and Constantinople. They also rejected papal invitations to link the
Serbian Orthodox Church with Rome, and they ruled their country through
a golden age. Serbia expanded its economy, and Dalmatian merchants sold
Serbian goods throughout Europe and the Levant. The Nemanje dynasty
left to Serbia masterpieces of religious art combining Western, Byzantine
and local styles.

Serbia dominated
the Balkans under Stefan Dusan (1331-55), who conquered lands extending
from Belgrade to present-day southern Greece. He proclaimed himself
emperor, elevated the archbishop of Pec to the level of patriarch, and
wrote a new legal code combining Byzantine law with Serbian customs.
Dusan had ambitions toward a weakened Byzantine Empire, but the Byzantine
emperor suspected his intentions and summoned the Turks to restrain
him. Dusan repelled assaults in 1345 and 1349, but was defeated in 1352.
He then offered to lead an alliance against the Turks and recognize
the pope, but those gambits also were rejected.

Rival nobles divided
Serbia after the death of Dusan in 1355, and many switched loyalty to
the sultan after the last Nemanja died in 1371. The most powerful Serbian
prince, Lazar Hrebeljanovic, raised a multinational force to engage
the Turks in the Battle of Kosovo Polje on St. Vitus Day in 1389. The
Turks barely defeated Lazar, and both he and the sultan were killed.
The defeat did not bring immediate Turkish occupation of Serbia, but
during the centuries of Turkish domination that followed, the Serbs
endowed the battle with myths of honor and heroism that helped them
preserve their dignity and sense of nationhood. Serbs still recite epic
poems and sing songs about the nobles who fell at Kosovo Polje. The
anniversary of the battle is the Serbian national holiday, Vidovdan
(St. Vituss Day), June 28.

St. Milutin, the King of Serbia fresco in Gracanica Monastery

Turkish Conquest
of Serbia

Civil war in the
Turkish Empire saved Serbia in the early 15th century, but the Turks
soon reunited their forces to conquer the last Serbian stronghold at
Smederjevo in 1459 and subjugate the whole country. Serbs fled to Hungary,
Montenegro, Croatia, Dalmatia and Bosnia, and some formed outlaw bands.
In response to the activities of the latter, the Turks disinterred and
burned the remains of St. Sava.

By the 16th century,
southern Hungary had a sizable Serbian population that remained after
the Turks conquered the region in 1526. Montenegro, which emerged as
an independent principality after the death of Dusan, waged continual
guerrilla war on the Turks, and was never conquered. The Turkish threat,
however, did force Prince Ivan of Montenegro to move his capital high
into the mountains. There, he founded a monastery and set up a printing
press. In 1516 Montenegro became a theocratic state.

Social and economic
life in Serbia changed radically under the absolute rule of the Turkish
sultan. The Turks split Serbia among several provinces, conscripted
Serbian boys into their elite forces, exterminated Serbian nobles, and
deprived the Serbs of contact with the West as the Renaissance was beginning.
The Turks used the Orthodox Church to intermediate between the state
and the peasantry, but they expropriated most church lands. Poorly trained
Serbian priests strove to maintain the decaying national identity.

In 1459, the sultan
subordinated the Serbian Church to the Greek patriarch, but the Serbs
hated Greek dominance of their church, and in 1557, Grand Vizier Mehmed
Pasha Sokolovic, a Serb who had been inducted into the Turkish army
as a boy, persuaded the sultan to restore autonomy to the Serbian Church.
Turkish maltreatment and exploitation grew in Serbia after the 16th
century, and more Serbs fled to become "hajduci" (mountain
outlaws).

Unsuccessful
Serb Rebellions

From 1684 to 1689,
Christian forces attempted to push the Turks from the Balkans, inciting
the Serbs to rebel against their Turkish overlords. The offensive rebellion
ultimately failed, exposing the Serbs south of the Sava River to the
revenge of the Turks. Fearing Turkish reprisals, the Serbian patriarch,
Arsenije III Carnojevic, immigrated in 1690 to Austrian-ruled southern
Hungary with as many as 36,000 families.

Great
Serb Migration in front of Ottomans, 1690

The Austrian emperor
promised these people religious freedom as well as the right to elect
their own "vojvoda" (military governor), and incorporated
much of the region where they settled, later known as Vojvodina, into
the military border. The refugees founded new monasteries that became
cultural centers. In Montenegro, Danilo I Petrovic of Njegos (1696-1737)
became bishop-prince and instituted the succession of the Petrovic-Njegos
family. His efforts to unify Montenegro triggered a massacre of Muslims
in 1702 and subsequent reprisals.

Austrian forces
took Serbian regions south of the Sava from Turkey in 1718, but Jesuits
following the army proselytized so heavily that the Serbs came to hate
the Austrians as well as the Turks. In the 18th century, the Turkish
economy and social fabric began deteriorating, and the Serbs who remained
under the Ottoman Empire suffered attacks from bands of soldiers. Corrupt
Greek priests, who had replaced Serbian clergy at the sultans
direction, also took advantage of the Serbs. The Serbs in southern Hungary
fared much better. They farmed prosperously in the fertile Danubian
plain. A Serbian middle class arose, and the monasteries trained scholars
and writers who inspired national pride, even among illiterate Serbs.

The 18th century
brought Russian involvement in European events, particularly in competition
with Austria for the spoils of the Turkish collapse. The Orthodox Serbs
looked to the tsar for support, and Russia forged ties with Montenegro
and the Serbian Church in southern Hungary. In 1774, Russia won the
diplomatic right to protect Christian subjects of the Turks; later it
used this right as a pretext to intervene in Turkish affairs.

When Russia and
Austria fought another war with Turkey in 1787 and 1788, Serbs fought
guerrilla battles against the Turks. Austria abandoned the campaign,
and the Serbs, in 1791. To secure their frontier, the Turks granted
their Serbian subjects a measure of autonomy and formed a Serbian militia.
Montenegro expanded in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. Bishop-Prince
Petar I Njegos (1782-1830) convinced the sultan to declare that the
Montenegrins had never been Turkish subjects, and Montenegro remained
independent through the 19th century.

In 1804, renegade
Turkish soldiers in Belgrade murdered Serbian leaders, triggering a
popular uprising under Karadjordje ("Black George") Petrovic,
founder of the Karadjordjevic dynasty. Russia supported the Serbs, and
in 1806, the sultan granted them limited autonomy. Internal discord,
however, weakened the government of Karadjordje, and the French invasion
of Russia in 1812 prevented the tsar from protecting the Serbs.

In 1813, the Turks
attacked rebel areas. Karadjordje fled to Hungary, then Turkish, Bosnian
and Albanian troops plundered Serbian villages. The atrocities sparked
a second Serbian uprising in 1815 that won autonomy under Turkish control
for some regions. The corrupt rebel leader Milos Obrenovic (1817-39)
had Karadjordje murdered and his head sent to the sultan to signal Serbian
loyalty.

Serbia as Principality

In 1830, Turkey
recognized Serbia as a principality under Turkish control, with Milos
Obrenovic as hereditary prince. The sultan also granted the Serbian
Church autonomy and reaffirmed the Russian right to protect Serbia.
Poor administration, corruption and a bloody rivalry between the Karadjordjevic
and Obrenovic clans marred Serbian political life from its beginning.

After the sultan
began allowing foreign governments to send diplomats to Serbia in the
1830s, foreign intervention further complicated the situation. Despite
these obstacles and his autocratic manner, however, Milos Obrenovic
stimulated trade, opened schools and guided development of peasant lands.
He abdicated in 1838 when Turkey imposed a constitution to limit his
powers.

In the 18th and
19th centuries, Serbian culture made significant strides. Dositej Obradovic,
Vuk Karadzic and other scholars accelerated a national renaissance.
Through his translations and autobiography, Obradovic spread the Enlightenment
to the Serbs. Collections of Serbian folk songs and poems edited by
Karadzic awoke pride in national history and traditions. Karadzic also
overcame clerical opposition to reform the Cyrillic alphabet and the
Serbian literary language, and he translated the New Testament. His
work widened the concept of Serbian nationhood to include language as
well as religious and regional identifications.

The European revolution
of 1848 eroded relations between the Serbs and their neighbors. As part
of their revolutionary program, the Hungarians threatened to Magyarize
the Serbs in Vojvodina. Some Serbs there declared their independence
from Hungary and proclaimed an autonomous Vojvodina; others rallied
behind the Austrian-Croatian invasion of Hungary. The Serbs nearly declared
war, but Russians and Turkish diplomacy restrained them. The Serbs in
Hungary gained nothing from helping Austria to crush the revolution.
Vienna ruled Vojvodina harshly after 1850 and silenced Serbian irredentists
there.

When Austria joined
Hungary to form the Dual Monarchy in 1867, Vienna returned Vojvodina
and its Serbs to Hungary. Meanwhile, Peter II Njegos of Montenegro (1830-51),
who was also a first-rate poet, reformed his administration, battled
the Turks and struggled to obtain a seaport from the Austrians. His
successor, Danilo II (1851-60), abolished the Montenegrin theocracy.

Prince Mihajlo Obrenovic
(1860-68), son of Milos, was an effective ruler who further loosened
the Turkish grip on Serbia. Western-educated and autocratic, Mihajlo
liberalized the constitution and, in 1867, secured the withdrawal of
Turkish garrisons from Serbian cities. Industrial development began
at this time, although 80 percent of Serbias 1.25 million people
remained illiterate peasants. Mihajlo sought to create a South Slav
confederation, and he organized a regular army to prepare for liberation
of Turkish-held Serbian territory. Scandal undermined Mihajlos
popularity, however, and he was eventually assassinated.

Celekula - Skull Tower in Nis

Political parties
emerged in Serbia after 1868, and aspects of Western culture began to
appear. A widespread uprising in the Ottoman Empire prompted an unsuccessful
attack by Serbia and Montenegro in 1876, and a year later those countries
allied with Russian, Romanian and Bulgarian rebels to defeat the Turks.
The subsequent treaties of San Stefano and Berlin (1878) made Serbia
an independent state and added to its territory, while Montenegro gained
a seacoast.

Alarmed at Russian
gains, the growing stature of Serbia, and irredentism among Vojvodinas
Serbs, Austria-Hungary pressed for and won the right to occupy Bosnia,
Herzegovina and the Novi Pazar in 1878. Serbias Prince Milan Obrenovic
(1868-89), a cousin of Mihajlo, became disillusioned with Russia and
fearful of the newly created Bulgaria. He, therefore, signed a commercial
agreement in 1880 that made Serbia a virtual client state of Austria-Hungary.
Milan became the first king of modern Serbia in 1882, but his pro-Austro-Hungarian
policies undermined his popularity, and he abdicated in 1889.

A regency ruled
Serbia until 1893, when Milans teenage son, Aleksandar (1889-1903),
pronounced himself of age and nullified the constitution. Aleksandar
was widely unpopular in Serbia because of scandals, arbitrary rule and
his position favoring Austria-Hungary. In 1903 military officers, including
Dragutin "Apis" Dimitrijevic, brutally murdered Aleksandar
and his wife. Europe condemned the killings, which were celebrated in
Belgrade.

Petar Karadjordjevic
(1903-14), who knew of the conspiracy, returned from exile to take the
throne, restored and liberalized the constitution, put Serbian finances
in order, and improved trade and education. Petar turned Serbia away
from Austria-Hungary and toward Russia, and in 1905 Serbia negotiated
a tariff agreement with Bulgaria hoping to break the Austro-Hungarian
monopoly of its exports. In response to a diplomatic disagreement, Vienna
placed a punitive tariff on livestock, Serbias most important
export. Serbia, however, refused to bend, found new trade routes and
began seeking an outlet to the sea.

In 1908, Austria-Hungary
formally annexed Bosnia and Herzegovina, frustrating Serbian designs
on those regions and precipitating an international crisis. The Serbs
mobilized, but under German pressure Russia persuaded Belgrade to cease
its protests. Thereafter, Belgrade maintained strict official propriety
in its relations with Vienna; but government and military factions prepared
for a war to liberate the Serbs still living under the Turkish yoke
in Kosovo, Macedonia and other regions.

Balkan Wars and
the First World War

The Balkan Wars
and World War I had dramatic consequences for the South Slavs. In the
Balkan Wars, Serbia helped expel the Turks from Europe and regained
lands lost in medieval times. By 1914, the alliances of Europe and the
ethnic friction among the South Slavs had combined to make Bosnia the
ignition point, and Serbia one of the main battlegrounds, of World War
I. When Austria-Hungary collapsed after the war, fear of an expansionist
Italy inspired Serbian, Croatian and Slovenian leaders to form the new
federation known as Yugoslavia

Ethnic hatred, religious
rivalry, language barriers and cultural conflicts plagued the Kingdom
of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (later renamed the Kingdom of Yugoslavia)
from its inception. The question of centralization versus federalism
bitterly divided the Serbs and Croats; democratic solutions were blocked
and dictatorship was made inevitable because political leaders had little
vision, no experience in parliamentary government, and no tradition
of compromise. Hostile neighboring states resorted to regicide to disrupt
the kingdom, and only when European war threatened in 1939 did the Serbs
and Croats attempt a settlement. That solution, however, came too late
to matter.

The Kingdom of the
Serbs, Croats and Slovenes encompassed most of the Austrian Slovenian
lands, Croatia, Slavonia, most of Dalmatia, Serbia, Montenegro, Vojvodina,
Kosovo, the Serbian controlled parts of Macedonia, and Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Territorial disputes disrupted relations with Italy, Austria, Hungary,
Bulgaria and Albania. Italy posed the most serious threat to Yugoslavia.
Although it received Zadar, Istria, Trieste and several Adriatic islands
in the postwar treaties and took Rijeka by force, Italy resented not
receiving all the territory promised under the 1915 Treaty of London.
Rome subsequently supported Croatian, Macedonian and Albanian extremists,
hoping to stir unrest and hasten the end of Yugoslavia. Revisionist
Hungary and Bulgaria also backed anti-Yugoslav groups.

The creation of
Yugoslavia fulfilled the dreams of many South Slavic intellectuals who
disregarded fundamental differences among 12 million people of the new
country. The Serbs, Croats and Slovenes had conflicting political and
cultural traditions, and the South Slav kingdom also faced sizable non-Slav
minorities, including Germans, Albanians, Hungarians, Romanians, and
Turks, with scatterings of Italians, Greeks, Czechoslovaks, Slovaks,
Ruthenians, Russians, Poles, Bulgars, Sephardic and Ashkenazic Jews
and Romanies.

The Orthodox, Roman
Catholic, Islamic, Uniate, Jewish and Protestant faiths all were well
established and cut across ethnic and territorial lines. In addition
to the divisiveness of a large number of minority languages, linguistic
differences also split the Serbs, Croats, Slovenes and Macedonian Slavs.
Many people regarded the new government and its laws as alien, exploitative
and secondary to kinship loyalties and traditions.

The Serbs
memories of their medieval kingdom, their 1389 defeat by the Ottoman
Turks, their 19th century uprisings, and their heavy sacrifices during
20th century wars contributed significantly to their feeling that they
had sacrificed much for Yugoslavia and received relatively little in
return.

After the Second
World War

After World War
II and German Nazi occupation, a socialist federation of Yugoslavia,
including Serbia, Montenegro and the other former Yugoslav territories,
was formed. Josip Broz Tito became the leader and remained in power
until his death in 1980.

In the late 1980s,
a passionate Serbian nationalist revival arose from this sense of unfulfilled
expectation, from the postwar distribution of the Serbs among various
Yugoslav political entities, and from perceived discrimination against
the Serbs in Kosovo in the 1970s and 1980s. In this process, the Serbian
Orthodox Church re-emerged as a strong cultural influence, and the government
of Serbia renewed celebrations of the memories of Serbian heroes and
deeds. These events caused leaders in Slovenia and Croatia to fear a
resurgence of the Serbian hegemony that had disrupted interwar Yugoslavia.

The Serbian-Albanian
struggle for Kosovo, the heartland of Serbias medieval kingdom,
dominated Serbias political life in the 1980s. Between 1948 and
1990, the Serbian share of Kosovos population dropped from 23.6
percent to less than 10 percent, while the ethnic Albanian share increased
in proportion because of a high birth rate and immigration from Albania.

The demographic
change was also the result of political and economic conditions; the
postwar Serbian exodus from Kosovo accelerated in 1966 after ethnic
Albanian communist leaders gained control of the province, and Kosovo
remained the most poverty-stricken region of Yugoslavia in spite of
huge government investments. After reasserting political control over
Kosovo in 1989, the Serbian government announced an ambitious program
to resettle Serbs in Kosovo, but the plan attracted scant interest among
Serbian emigres from the region.

In the republics
of Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Serbs situation was more
complex and potentially more explosive than in Kosovo. Despite denials
from the governments of both republics, Serbs in Croatia, Bosnia and
Herzegovina complained bitterly in the late 1980s about ethnically based
discrimination and threats. The Serbian government reacted with published
exposes of World War II atrocities against Serbs and the Croatian chauvinism
that had inspired them.

Milosevic comes
to power

In July 1990, a
referendum was passed essentially removing the autonomous designations
from Kosovo and Vojvodina. Then, in November and December 1990, Slobodan
Milosevic was elected to the presidency. During 1991 and 1992, thousands
were killed during the civil war between the republics of former Yugoslavia.
In early 1992, United Nations peacekeeping troops were deployed to the
area to help quell the fighting in the region.

In the course of
1991-92, Slovenia, Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina seceded from Yugoslavia
through violence, while Macedonia separated peacefully. The secessionist
republics quickly won international recognition. Serbia and Montenegro
chose to stay in Yugoslavia. At the joint session of the assemblies
of Yugoslavia, Serbia and Montenegro in Belgrade on Apr. 27, 1992, the
Serbs and Montenegrins adopted the constitution of the Federal Republic
of Yugoslavia.

Since Serbia-Montenegro
was under de facto rule of President Milosevic, the army was under the
control of Milosevics ally, General Momcilo Perisic. No particular
opposition movement, including the Serbian Renewal movement or the semi-fascist
Serbian Radical Party, managed to offer a serious challenge to Milosevics
control. Indeed, when opposition leaders called for a non-confidence
vote in the government, Milosevic dissolved parliament and called for
new elections.

Milosevics
regime was faced with trying to maintain political control of the volatile
and predominantly Albanian region of Kosovo, as well as the unstable
Sandzak Muslin enclave next to Bosnia. Interestingly, the Milosevic
administration had some degree of a challenge from then-Montenegrin
president, Momir Bulatovic, who, in the early 1990s, demonstrated an
increasingly independent pattern of policy making. At that time, several
Montenegrin members of Milosevics coalition in parliament resigned
in protest of Montenegros subordinate relations with Serbia.